CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD: DAY ELEVEN

"SPENDING" CHRISTMAS WITH SANTA

In Toobworld, the most prevalent source for Santa Claus sightings are in the commercials, the blipverts. I think it's safe to say that Santa has been invoked more often to sell products than Abe Lincoln and George Washington combined.

My tele-buddy Hugh Davis might argue that all of these Santas are the same St. Nick and that they all belong in the "Ad-verse", his coined name for a TV universe that is made up only of TV commercials. Sometimes, there are blipverts that are too difficult to realistically squeeze into the logical confines of the main Toobworld, but for the most part I'd rather keep them all in either Earth Prime-Time or one of its alternate dimensions, rather than a whole new universe like Skitlandia or the Tooniverse. (Otherwise, we'd lose out on all of the characters and the physics-warping attributes those commercials provide.)

For me, the greatest of all the Santa Clauses in TV commercials exists in the alternate dimension where we'd also find Gumby and Pokey, Davey and Goliath, Moral Orel, and all of the characters from 'Robot Chicken' and those Rankin-Bass puppetoons - the clay/stop motion Toobworld.

It's a classic, truly vintage blipvert that has to be up there in the top ten of holiday advertisements: Santa Claus riding downhill on a Norelco triple-headed razor. (One of my favorite Christmas cards which I've sent out over the last few years shows Santa riding the wrong side of the razor!)

Another one that's been popular the last few years shows Santa Claus and the M&M candy guys finally facing each other and realizing that they each exist. Okay, I know I'm a bit of a simpleton, but watching Santa and Red faint because of their encounter never gets old for me.

So far as I'm concerned, this is another example of the main Toobworld Santa Claus, employing yet another disguise in case he met some humans in the house. He just never expected to find a couple of anthropomorphized candy snacks.

For this holiday TV season, there are three commercials featuring Santa Claus which I'd like to examine....

One of these blipverts is for Loew's, the helpful hardware place and we see Santa Claus outside the store examining his list. You can see what's coming long before it happens, as there's a terribly strong wind swirling all about St. Nick. The wind grabs the list out of Santa's hands and blows it away. Luckily a Loew's employee is there to suggest that Santa give out Loew's gift cards instead.

That guy better be getting a major promotion from the home office!

But then again, I don't think that's the real Santa Claus. I would think that a Spirit - practically a demi-god! - like Santa, who could deliver all of the toys in one night and use magic to get into people's houses, would be able to bend the winds to his will and force the list to come floating back to his hands.

I'm thinking that this was just some ordinary Joe who was a bit eccentric; someone who enjoyed doing his Christmas shopping dressed as Santa Claus, to fully celebrate in keeping with the spirit of the season. And when he lost his list, he substituted with the gift cards which would all be charged to his credit card, like any other guy would do.

The other interpretation of Santa Claus is a little more troubling when it comes to a Toobworld overview. Taken on its own, it should be considered warm, tender, and loving: Santa goes shopping for something special for the little lady, and he gets her diamonds. (My memory is shot nowadays, but I'm thinking this was an ad for Kay Jewelers. It might have been for Zayle's....)

In the end, Santa ans his woman are all cozy in their hideaway, and you know he's going to get some good lovin' that night because of his thoughtful gift. Like I said, all warm and tender, right?

Wrong!

Thanks to a TV movie which starred Angela Lansbury and Charles Durning, Mrs. Claus of the main Toobworld must resemble a certain mystery novelist from Cabot Cove, Maine. And I don't think that the Missus shares the same metamorphing ability as her husband.

So although Santa Claus could be the one for the main Toobworld, as played by Charles Durning (but this time in disguise), that wouldn't be Mrs. Claus. That SHOULDN'T be Mrs. Claus!

If this was the main Toobworld, then it looks like Santa is gifting his mistress with a little holiday bling.

Not the image a company would want to foster in Toobworld, even if they cared that such an interpretation of the TV Universe existed.

So here's my proposal - o'bviously, this is a Santa Claus from an alternate dimension. He could still look like Charles Durning, but just happened to still be wearing the visage he assumed to visit the jewelery store at the mall. As for the woman in the advert, she would be Mrs. Claus, but not the same woman to be found in the main Toobworld. Here, the dimension had a divergence based on the choice Santa made when it came to matters of the heart.

Finally, there's yet another blipvert in which I totally forget what the product is. (This may be more the failing of the advertising company to burn the product's name into my memory than it is of my memory itself.)

Santa and one of his elves have been pulled over to the side of the road by a police officer. When Santa can't produce his driver's license or his registration, the commercial warns us that we'll probably be on our own when it comes to providing presents.

I have no problem with this being the Santa Claus of the main Toobworld; and it provides the jolly old elf with a new adventure (albeit 30 seconds in length!) for 2006, to go along with his cameo appearance at the end of the Christmas episode of 'Las Vegas' this year.

We don't learn who the elf is, but he's definitely not Gumdrop, the serlinguistic elf who addresses us from the big red chair in the blipvert for Radio Shack. I don't know who that actor is, but he isn't bad. I could see him assaying the role of one of Dr. Loveless' descendants someday......

(If I find out the names of the sponsors for these blipverts, I'll come back in and edit this piece.)

As Stan Freberg used to sing, Christmas comes but once a year so you better make hay while the snow is falling. So, in keeping with the spirit of this seasonal post, there's only one way to sign off. Instead of my usual "BCnU!", may I just say....

Buy Buy!
Tele-Toby

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD: DAY TEN

"HO HO HO!
Now, my friends, I will show you
the way the real Santa Claus should look.
Please! As if there was such a person as Santa Claus,
which is of course absolutely ridiculous in a people's democracy!"
Chairman Georgi Koz
'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.'

As mentioned earlier, there have been many incarnations of the "Real" Santa Claus on Television. Many of those to be found in TV series, ('Bewitched', 'Batman', 'Las Vegas', and 'The Love Boat', for example) are all the same St. Nick, but with a different appearance for each occasion.

But there are Santas out there who must find their home at the North Pole of alternate TV dimensions. In this, they are no different from the many portrayals of other historical characters, like John F. Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln, and Frankenstein's Monster.

In my second posting for the season, I used Art Carney's interpretation in three different productions as the reason to make his residence in the evil mirror universe. As to where these other Kris Kringles should be located, I'll leave that as a Christmas mystery. The remake dimension? The Jed Bartlet dimension? The dimension where women are the dominant gender? (Well, I have an idea for that one....)

In some of these dimensions, it is the same jolly old elf as has been known since the legend began. Others are recruited, as was Henry Corwin (Carney) in that episode of 'The Twilight Zone'. For still others, it's a family business that eventually is also handed down to the heir apparent, whether that's a Nick or a Nikki.

Here are just some of the alternate versions of Santa Claus.

Santas in need of replacements:
Lloyd Bridges (Santa Claus)
. . . In the Nick of Time (1991) (TV)
Nigel Hawthorne (Nick)
. . . Call Me Claus (2001) (TV)

Santas with offspring:
Matthew Walker (I) (Santa Claus)
. . . Twice Upon a Christmas (2001) (TV)
George Wendt (I) (Santa Claus)
. . . Santa Baby (2006) (TV)
John Wheeler (XI) (Santa Claus)
. . . Meet the Santas (2005) (TV)
. . . Single Santa Seeks Mrs. Claus (2004) (TV)

Santas with problems:
James Coco (Santa Claus)
. . . Curious Case of Santa Claus, The (1982) (TV)
Harry Frazier (Santa Claus)
. . . Elf Who Saved Christmas, The (1992) (TV)
. . . Elf and the Magic Key, The (1993) (TV)
George Hamilton (I) (Santa Claus)
. . . Too Cool for Christmas (2004) (TV)
John B. Lowe (I) (Santa Claus)
. . . Ultimate Christmas Present, The (2000) (TV)
Leslie Nielsen (Santa Claus)
. . . Santa Who? (2000) (TV)
Dick Van Patten (Santa Claus)
. . . Santa Trap, The (2002) (TV)

This is not a complete list, not by a long shot. I never fully investigated TV characters by the names of "Kris Kringle", "St. Nick", "St. Nicholas", or "Father Christmas". And there are a few Santas who show up in blipverts (the Toobworld word for commercials) who couldn't possibly be THE Santa Claus of Earth Prime-Time.

But more on those guys tomorrow.....

There is another alt. dimension Santa for Toobworld who has not yet had the chance to come into being. In "Checking It Twice", Santa would become separated from his elf with the list and until they are reunited, he can't deliver the toys properly. Writer/Producer Bryce Zabel co-wrote the script and he and his partner have been trying to get this project off the ground for years.

Unfortunately, it looks as though they may have finally faced reality (Ugh!) and accepted that it will never be made for TV. But because of that, they are offering those who may be interested a chance to read the script in PDF format at Bryce's site, "For What It's Worth". (Look for Bryce's name in the links to the left and click that to find the script.)

I harbor no illusions about the power of "Inner Toob", but who knows? Maybe somebody will learn about "Checking It Twice" from reading about it here, and finally make this particular dream come true.

Isn't that what Christmas miracles are all about?

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD: DAY NINE

THE TV UNIVERSE AS WINTER WONDERLAND

TVSquad.com ran a contest to celebrate Festivus, asking its readers to rewrite a Christmas song to reflect our Television obsessions.

Click here if you want to read the winning entry by Liz:

I entered the contest as well, and the song reflects my "big tent" view of Toobworld.

I don't want my entry to die a lonely death in the comments section of the contest post. So to give it some semblance of immortality, I'd like to now present "Living In The TV Universe" (sung to the tune of "Winter Wonderland"):

LIVING IN THE TV UNIVERSE
*
Killer Bees
Hear them buzzin'
Patty Lane
And her cousin
All of the casts
From shows in the past
Living in the TV Universe!

*

Mister Ed

and the Riddler
And from 'Roots',

there is Fiddler,
Plus all of the folks
From 'Diff'rent Strokes'
Living in the TV Universe!

Hooterville's the place where they can gather
To celebrate the closing of the year
We'll see Beaver Cleaver (Jerry Mathers)
And Floyd the Barber played by H. McNear.

*

Doctor Who,

Bert and Ernie,
Hercules

on his journey
A Sanford named Fred
A Baxter named Ted
Living in the TV Universe!

Archie Bunker argues with the Sleestaks
Jeannie's blinking after Fonzie flirts
Sgt. Friday's looking just for the facts
And Kirk beams down expendable "red-shirts".

*

Emma Peel

and Miss Piggy,
Lennie and

his pal Squiggy
Tossing hats with Mary
It's legen- wait!- dary!
Living in the TV Universe!

Living in the TV Universe....
Living in the TV Universe....

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD: DAY EIGHT

MERRY CHRISTMAS, BABY!
[CINDY LOU WHO AT 42]

Any one of the Iddiots at the Idiot's Delight Digest can tell you that I'm somewhat infamous for "going there" in my posts to the IDD. It's a delicate dance, "Going There And Back Again", and there have been a few times when I've gone too far in what I wrote.

This may be one of those times.......

Except for certain characters in the Tooniverse (that TV Universe for cartoon characters), like the Flintstones, Time has no meaning when it comes to the aging process. There was an episode of 'The Simpsons' in which we learned that Bart was born in 1984, and yet here we are in 2006 and he's still in the third grade.

In the main Toobworld, 'The Prisoner' took place back in the late 1960s, but the pen-and-ink Number Six of the Tooniverse (again, from an episode of 'The Simpsons') looks to be the same age as his flesh-and-blood counterpart from 1967. Batman eventually will retire to be replaced by 'Batman Beyond', but until that happens, the animated Batman we see nowadays is the same Caped Crusader that's been around since before the 'Super Friends'!

This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the animated version of 'How The Grinch Stole Christmas', and for me it has never gotten old. (I still thrill with the race down the side of the mountain, my favorite sequence!) Sadly, here in the Real World Time does march on and we've lost all five of the major players in the creation of this masterpiece - Thurl Ravenscroft, who sang the songs; Albert Hague, who wrote the music; Boris Karloff, who narrated and provided the voice of the Grinch; the legen- wait for it! - dary animator Chuck Jones who brought the production to life; and Theodore Geisel, "Dr. Seuss" himself, who first created this wonderful tale.

As far as I know, only June Foray is still alive. She provided the voice of little Cindy Lou Who, who was no more than two. And it is Cindy Lou who is the focus of this Christmas Cracker......

Like I said, Time has no meaning in the Tooniverse for the most part, not even in the microscopic speck of a world where Whoville is located. But if the years passed as they do in the Real World, so much would have changed in the time since we last visited the Whos down in Whoville, the tall and the small.

For instance, Max would have long been dead, perhaps buried in a now-forgotten grave at the base of Mt. Crumpet. The Grinch might still be alive, even though he was already over 70 years old at the time of the story. (He mentions that he's been bothered by the arrival of Christmas to Whoville for over 70 years.) The Grinch was certainly not of the same species as the Whos, and could have been some kind of mythic, immortal creature.

And then there's Cindy Lou Who, the only Who down in Whoville whom we got to know by name. At the time of the story, she would have been no more than two - making her forty-two today, if the story's timeline progressed at the same rate as that in the Real World.

Ah, 42! One of those prime magical numbers in the TV Universe, thanks to 'The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy' and 'Lost'. And at 42, Cindy Lou Who would be resplendent in her maturity as a woman, I'm thinking; as beautiful as she may have been 20 years earlier at the age of 22.

I realize I'm projecting what she may look like as an adult, extrapolating from the fleeting images we have of her as a two-year old in the special. (And NO! I'm not into that, you sickos! I'm thinking of her strictly as an adult.) Based on what we saw of the other Whos down in Whoville (I just can't break myself away from typing that phrase!), the odds may have been against her from being considered sexy in human terms.

But it could be that Cindy Lou was some kind of genetic mutation, the progenitor of the next evolutionary step in the development of the Whos. She certainly doesn't look to be descended from the two Whos who appear to be her parents in the special........

So I keep wondering what she may have looked like grown up, and for an animated woman of a certain age, I think she'd still be gorgeous. And I have to confess to something else that would make her adult version sexy to me - a sense of "xenophilia" - that attraction to what is alien.

It's the same sensation I get from T'Pol of 'Enterprise' and Raffalo the plumber (perhaps a Bolian?) from the 'Doctor Who' episode "The End Of The World". Pointy ears and blue skin - who wouldn't find those chicks sexy? Then there's the sultry grey cast to Chiara on 'Farscape', and that prehensile tail of Trace Gemini's in 'Andromeda'. And let's not forget the green-skinned Orion slave girls of 'Star Trek'!

With Cindy Lou Who, it's the insectoid antennae which adds that sexy alien allure. In a way, she reminds me of the character Moonmaid created by Chester Gould for his comic strip 'Dick Tracy'. Back when I was a little kid, at an age when I still thought girls to be "bloopy" (as Will Robinson would say), I found Moonmaid attractive as well.

So, yeah. This is what it has devolved into - lusting after alien babes for Christmas. Once again, I'm "going there" and I'm sure it guarantees me a spot on this year's "Naughty" list.

That's okay. I've been there before; I know my way around.....

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD - DAY SEVEN

THE DARK KNIGHT MEETS THE JOLLY OLD ELF

In the last first-run broadcast of a 'Brothers & Sisters' episode, Cooper Whedon was singing a traditional Christmas favorite.....

Jingle Bells
Batman smells
Robin laid an egg
Batmobile
lost its wheel
and Joker got away
hey!

Yeah... it never gets old.....

What makes it different for young Master Cooper is that he lives in a world where Batman actually exists.

For Earth Prime-Time, Batman fought crime and served the citizens of Gotham City beginning in the mid-1960s. (The cartoon versions all exist in the Tooniverse. 'Birds of Prey', about Batman's daughter and her crime-fighting allies, takes place in an alternate TV dimension, most likely the evil mirror universe.)

That inocuous jingle would then have some basis in "reality" for its origins.

This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the encounter between Batman and Robin with Santa Claus. It was December, 1966 and the Dynamic Duo were doing one of their famous Bat-climbs up the side of a building in pursuit of the minor villain The Puzzler.

Suddenly, when what to their wondering eyes should appear but Santa Claus, who threw open the sash and popped his head out of one of the windows to see what was the matter as they passed by.

Sorry about that, Chief. Got carried away......

We can say for certain that Santa Claus was appearing in yet another of his guises, instead of with his normal visage that makes him look like the actor Charles Durning. Even buried under a rather fulsome white beard, you can tell he was assuming a new incarnation, if just for the voice alone! (A Real World note: Santa Claus was played by character actor Andy Devine, whose uniquely scratchy twang was due to an accident as a child, when he had been running with a stick in his mouth and he scratched his vocal chords.)

It could be that The Minstrel found out about their meeting with Kris Kringle and composed that little ditty as a way of needling the Caped Crusader and the Boy Wonder. Perhaps their arch-villain The Joker heard about it as it made the rounds of the Gotham City criminal underworld. And if so, of course he would have seen to it that the lyrics were slightly altered so that he would be the one to come out looking good.

Of course, there are other possibilities when it comes to the identity of St. Nick. He may not have been the real Santa Claus, but just a guy dressed up in the red suit for an office party or to give the little children of Gotham City a chance to tell Santa their last minute wishes for Christmas.

Perhaps, being full of the Christmas Spirit (nudge, nudge, wink, wink), he presented himself to Batman and Robin as if he really was Santa Claus. And they, being respectful towards the citizenry of Gotham even if they were inebriated, obligingly played along with the deception.

He could also have been a character we met before in 'The Twilight Zone', by the name of Frisby. He lived in North Carolina, not far from Mayberry of 'The Andy Griffith Show'. (Floyd the Barber's identical cousin lived there. Maybe it was his half-brother - Old Man Lawson must have been a horndog!)

As to why Frisby was up north in Gotham City, dressed as Santa Claus? Well, that would more than likely be the basis for yet another tall tale that would entertain his friends back at the general store. And the fact that he met Batman and Robin would be almost as big a whopper to them as the time when he told them that he was kidnapped by aliens!

Perhaps one of those cracker barrel buddies pulled out his banjo and first played the 'Jingle Bells' parody right there.

Or maybe not.....

There's still one more possible player behind the beard - Andy Devine himself!

Andy Devine was the host of a children's show called 'Andy's Gang' from 1955 to 1960, replacing Smilin' Ed McConnell who passed away in 1954. And like all variety shows, 'Andy's Gang' would also have a counterpart within the TV Universe.

So Smilin' Andy could have been on a promotional tour across the country for the show, which in Toobworld would still be running by 1966. (In the Real World, it went off the air in 1960.) And being "Tis the season", Andy was probably dressed up as Santa Claus for his Gotham City appearance.

When he looked out that window and saw Batman and Robin, he may have been surrounded by the little children, some of whom were probably residents of the Gotham City Orphanage (which by the year 3000 may be known as the Gotham City Orphanarium). Their lives would have been full of enough pain as it was without him breaking character to reveal who he truly was to the Dynamic Duo.

If so, it could be that Batman was able to see inside the room and see kids gathered around and so he willingly played along.

If this had been Andy Devine appearing as Santa Claus for an 'Andy's Gang' promotional tour, then there can be only one culprit as to who thunked up that derisive spoof of 'Jingle Bells' - Andy's co-star Froggy the Gremlin!

It certainly sounds like the kind of mean-spirited and childish doggerel Froggy might have come up with to taunt Andy. Batman and Robin were probably lucky that Froggy didn't plunk his magic twanger to cause their Bat-rope to snap!

Like I said, those are just possibilities. However, this being such a magical season, I think I'll just stick with the simple splainin:

Batman and Robin actually did meet Santa Claus in December of 1966, and that historic encounter became the inspiration for a modern-day "folk song".

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

PS:
If you want to see what Santa Claus looked like when he met Batman and Robin, click here. And then follow the links to the page about the Bat-Climb. [Afterwards, check out the entire site. It's a great salute to the 1966 'Batman TV show!]

Also, Fred Hembeck has a HUGE page of "Santa Heads" (which may take some time loading!), in which there's a comic book representation of a meeting between Batman and Santa Claus. You can find it about 39 rows down......

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD - DAY SIX

O'BSERVATIONS - A VERY VEGAS XMAS

It's been awhile since I posted an "O'Bservation". So I figured it was time to do one with a Christmas theme. And the holiday episode of 'Las Vegas' gave me more than a theoretical link to 'Doctor Who' to work with....

1] Add Sam Marquez of the Montecito to the list of TV characters who got the chance to see the real Santa Claus. At the end of the Dec. 15th episode, she saw him flying across the Vegas horizon after the death of one of her favorite "whales".

And because he was so far away, and just a silhouette to be seen, why don't we just accept that had we seen him, he would have looked just like an actor named Charles Durning!

2] Like talk shows, news programs, and game shows, variety programs which are seen by us in the Real World, can also be seen by the people of Toobworld. The characters within those variety shows, however, actually exist in an alternate TV universe, based on comedy sketches.

So when Mike Cannon mentioned Hannukah Harry, he was thinking about the Jon Lovitz character from 'Saturday Night Live'. If he had been in "Skitlandia", Hannukah Harry would be a real person.

3] One of Big Ed's rules for his enforced "Secret Santa" exchange was "No Re-Gifting". As splained in this blog some time ago, this is not a reference to 'Seinfeld'. Re-gifting is a well-known tradition in Toobworld.

4] Although he wasn't actually seen or "heard" in the episode, Stephen Hawking added to his League of Themselves status when Big Ed made arrangements for Mike to speak with the noted astro-physicist in a video link hookup. We saw Mike's side of the conversation, therefore it has to be accepted that Hawking was on the other side.

5] This episode must have had animal rights groups up in arms when Delinda gave Sam a puppy as her Secret Santa gift. First of all, Sam is not really the type of person who's going to care for an animal. If it hadn't been for the death of her client and friend, she may have found a way to cause a fatal accident on the puppy. (Instead, she named it "Reggie" after her friend and warmed up to its companionship.)

It's a Rottweiler, so I wouldn't be surprised if Reggie grew up to become an occasional playuh on the security force for the Montecito!

But the real reason why the animal rights groups will be steamed is because they're trying hard to get the word out that you should never give a pet animal as a Christmas gift. It can be ignored and forgotten in all the hustle and bustle of the holidays. If you want to give a dog or cat as a gift, wait until after the holidays when everything has settled down.

6] Big Ed cut Mike some slack and let him wait until next year to put on a display that incorporates other holidays besides Christmas - like Hannukah and Kwanzaa. If the show lasts for one more season, we'll have to see if the writers and producers remember that detail......

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

CHRISTMAS IN TOOBWORLD: DAY FIVE

"DOCTOR WHO" & "LAS VEGAS": THE CHRISTMAS LINK

Gather round the "Who-philes" as well as the kiddies, because with today's Christmas cracker, we're linking 'Doctor Who' to 'Las Vegas'.

As Dwight Schrute of 'The Office' said, "It's a Christmas miracle!"

I've stated before that the current production of 'Doctor Who' is taking place in an alternate TV dimension. It has to be, since Russell T. Davies has seen fit to kill of Prime Minister Tony Blair and instead install Harriet Jones as the new PM during 2006.

The Eighth Incarnation of the Doctor, as played by Paul McGann in the 1996 TV movie, was the last time we saw the Time Lord in the main Toobworld.

But that doesn't mean his adventures have not been following the same basic plotline as those being shown in the TV program. And that includes the regenerations. Here in the main Toobworld, the Doctor has gone through two more regenerations, so that he has gone from looking like Paul McGann to resembling actors named Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant. We just haven't seen it happen in that version. (To be accurate, we never did see the regeneration from McGann to Eccleston in the alternate dimension either.)

In the main Toobworld version of 'Doctor Who', Tony Blair survived the attempt by "Aliens Of London" to cause "World War Three", and Harriet Jones did not become the Prime Minister.

Those episodes of 'Doctor Who' were shown in 2005, but they took place in 2006. And the 2005 holiday special, "The Christmas Invasion" will take place on Christmas Day of this year. In Toobworld, both the main version as well as in the alternate dimension, the invasion by the Sycorax soon after the regeneration of the Doctor into his tenth incarnation has not yet happened.

But we've already seen how that turns out here in the Real World: the Doctor defeats the leader of the Sycorax in mortal combat for the planet and holds the Sycorax to the rules of the engagement. (Since they lost, they have to leave Earth and never return, making sure to tell the rest of the universe that Earth has a new defender.)

Unbeknownst to the Gallifreyan, however, is that Prime Minister Harriet Jones has a secret weapon. As the spaceship is leaving Earth's orbit, she calls upon the services of the ultra-secret organization called 'Torchwood' to destroy the Sycorax spaceship, even though they were no longer a threat.

As the fragments of the spaceship - and the Sycorax people - re-enter the Earth's atmosphere, they will burn up to rain down from the skies as a fine ash... which many people will mistake for snow.

Now, that will all happen on Christmas in an alternate dimension, as seen on TV. But it will also happen for the Tenth Doctor of the main Toobworld as well. Only in his version, it will be Tony Blair who orders the Torchwood attack on the Sycorax.

And as the world turns in the main Toobworld, that ash will drift westward until late in the afternoon (Pacific time zone) when it will be falling in Las Vegas.

And even though it hasn't happened yet in Toobworld, we have already seen this "Christmas Miracle" of falling snow when the temperature was about 95°F. It happened this past Friday at the end of the 'Las Vegas' episode, "White Christmas".

As to why there was no mention of a spaceship hovering over London during that episode of 'Las Vegas', obviously Big Ed Deline and his employees were all too focused on their own personal problems regarding the holidays. And forget about the gamblers - nothing was ever going to make them look up from the craps tables... except maybe the mirrored bikini tops worn by "Santa's Helpers".

Having taken a taxi to get to work in Times Square during noon-time rush on 9/11, and seeing everybody in the streets going about their lives as if nothing had happened, I can believe that splainin.

And so, even though we only saw the alternate Toobworld version of that Christmas Invasion, it will happen to Earth Prime-Time as well. And all we will be able to see/have seen of it is/was the snowfall of Vegas. Behind the scenes, there is our Toobworld link between 'Doctor Who' and 'Las Vegas'.

Now, some might think it would have been easier just to declare that 'Las Vegas' should be dumped over in the same dimension where 'Doctor Who' is currently being seen.

They are neophytes.

To lose 'Las Vegas' in the skein of Toobworld would also mean that we'd have to move 'Crossing Jordan', 'Heroes', 'Passons', and the American version of 'The Office', which have all been linked in some way to 'Las Vegas'. And I am unwilling to lose so many wonderful shows from the "Great Link".

BCnU!
Tele-Toby